


Watching the Evening Slide Away

by Ywain Penbrydd (penbrydd)



Series: Vexation of Spirit [21]
Category: Criminal Minds (US TV), Shadow Unit, The Lone Gunmen (TV)
Genre: Apologies, Awkwardness, Dissociation, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Smut, nobody in this fic can just shut up and screw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:54:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28369449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/penbrydd/pseuds/Ywain%20Penbrydd
Summary: After almost getting killed five times in as many weeks and then going straight back into the field, Reid has a thirty-something hour dissociative episode.  Langly brings bagels and refuses to let him apologise for it.
Relationships: Richard "Ringo" Langly/Spencer Reid, Richard "Ringo" Langly/Spencer Reid/Chaz Villette
Series: Vexation of Spirit [21]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1058681
Comments: 16
Kudos: 10





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Earlgreyer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Earlgreyer/gifts).



> Be forewarned that Reid is not in his right mind and jumps to a lot of conclusions that don't _quite_ make sense. The unsettling irrationality and catastrophising are intentional! The dude has been through some shit on top of his shit, and he's having trouble getting started with the shovel.

Sunday -- was it Sunday? Reid thought it must be Sunday, though he didn't quite remember Saturday clearly, which was at once both terrifying and likely a blessing. Sunday, then, he woke again, curled up in the chair, buried under the same fluffy blanket Langly had wrapped around him, Friday evening. Evening? Probably night, though the light had still been dim. Of course, the light was always dim, here. He'd fallen asleep with the lights on, Friday night, and Langly had just left them, knowing that he wouldn't want to wake up in the dark, and not quite sure which light wouldn't wake him, if it were turned off.  
  
Hadn't mattered, he thought. He'd woken up to the light streaming through the curtains, just as he had, today. And today, he woke alone, with nothing but silence and the fading smell of coffee.  
  
He'd been rude. He'd been worse than useless. He'd been all the things he hated being, all the things he hated anyone seeing. All the reasons he'd always spent time alone, in this condition. And now? Now, he was alone.  
  
He was surprised Langly had put up with him that long.  
  
But, once again, he'd asked too much, and now he was alone, like he should have been from the moment he got home. Only now, he was embarrassed at himself. He'd put enough pieces back together to feel real regret at his decisions. He should have made Langly leave, on Friday night. But, instead, he'd asked him to stay and offered nothing in return. Worse than nothing.  
  
He didn't remember Langly leaving, and had no idea if he was coming back. And if not, well, he probably deserved it. _He_ knew what he was like. No one needed to put up with him in this condition. It was too much to ask of anyone, and he shouldn't have done it.  
  
And now, he could regret it. He curled up tighter in the chair and pulled the blanket over his head, unwilling to be aware of the sun, as he poured his grief down his face. He'd cry until he got sick, and then he'd pull himself together. He had to work tomorrow. He had to face the people he worked with, who would be asking about Langly. And he was pretty sure he was going to lie to them, to tell them everything was fine, to pretend he hadn't made an ass of himself and burned down another relationship in a matter of months.   
  
At least he knew Langly was still alive. He was relatively sure Langly had walked out of here because he wanted to, and there was a certain comfort in that. He'd screwed up, but they'd both lived.  
  
Reid heard the sound of the lock, and for a split second, he almost did nothing. Someone was letting themselves into his apartment, and that was fine, because maybe getting shot in his living room wasn't the worst thing that could happen right now.  
  
And then fourteen years of fieldwork kicked in, and he threw himself out of the chair, lunging for the bathroom. Down, open the cabinet, open the safe, as the door clicked open and he could hear someone come in, almost silently. Metal in his hand, and he peered around the bottom of the doorframe...   
  
Jeans. Those were Langly's knees.  
  
He quietly slipped his gun back into the cabinet and then cleared his throat.  
  
Langly turned away from the now-empty chair, grocery bags rustling in his hands. "Oh, hey. You're up!"  
  
"Ah, yeah. Yeah, I'm..." Reid cleared his throat again. "You know what, let me finish what I got up to do, and then we'll talk."  
  
He pushed himself back and shut the bathroom door, before he unloaded the gun and put it back in the safe as quietly as he could. He thought he'd just avoid mentioning what he'd actually gotten up to do, flush the toilet, throw some water on his face, and just... not mention he'd been afraid enough to go for the gun.  
  
In the mirror, though, he still looked like he'd been crying. He'd made an ass of himself, and now he looked like he'd made twice the ass of himself over that fact. Something else not to bring up. Nightmares. It was a nightmare, after all. It was just one he'd been awake for.  
  
He dried his face and went to the kitchen, where Langly was toasting bagels in the broiler. "Morning."  
  
"Didn't mean to wake you up. Definitely didn't mean to freak you out so bad you almost shot me." Langly glanced over his shoulder at Reid as he sliced another bagel. "You okay?"  
  
"I didn't--"  
  
"I heard you load it. I didn't hear you cock it." Langly waved Reid out of the way of the oven and bent down with tongs to get the first bagel out. "You should probably have breakfast."  
  
"Load it because there might be a problem, cock it because you have line of sight, and it _is_ a problem." Reid reached for the cream cheese, ignoring the raised eyebrow Langly gave him. "I did not almost shoot you. I just woke up, and I forgot Narcisse was dead." He paused, butter knife in one hand. "This isn't the conversation I came in here to have. I came in here to apologise for being an absolute nightmare for the last thirty-something hours, because I'm finally in a position to do that. I can't promise you it's not going to happen again, because it is."  
  
"Yeah, of course it is." Langly blinked at him. "Look, you're taking it pretty well for a guy who almost got murdered about once a week for a month straight, and then went straight back into the field with his partner in the hospital. And we both know your shrink doesn't have the clearance for what just happened to you, in at least two of the last five incidents, and they were the actually bad ones. So, I mean, _surprise_ , nervous breakdown. Eat a bagel and get out of the way of the coffee maker, so I can start a pot."  
  
Surprised, Reid stepped back and took a bite of bagel, looking like he might say something.  
  
"I'm not _stupid_ , Reid. I don't have a degree in headshrinking, like you and Villette, but I don't need one for something that _obvious_." Langly put the coffee on as he kept talking. "I'm not usually as gung-ho as you about stepping in front of bullets, in the proverbial sense, but I've been there and done that. And I've been living with _Byers_ for thirty years, and I swear to god he does it at least twice a year. So, yes, it's going to happen again, and I'm going to make sure you don't die before your brain reboots, because, really, _duh_." He whipped open the broiler with a loud screech that suggested the tracks needed to be oiled, and tossed the toasted bagel onto the cutting board, putting the next one in. "And stop eating my cream cheese. I'm supposed to be making you feel better, not making you hurl. I got you baba ghanouj, because they're everything bagels, and you can get away with that."  
  
Reid put down the half a bagel he was holding and wiped his hand on the dishtowel, because it was all he could reach, before he grabbed Langly by the shoulders. "No, listen to me. I have been inexcusably rude to you, and I am trying to apologise for that. I knew I wasn't well, and I asked you to stay, anyway. And I shouldn't have done that."  
  
"You told me you were being selfish, when you asked. You gave me a lot more warning than Byers ever does. And I told you I'd leave if you were too screwed up, even for me, and you know what? I'm standing here with bagels, and if you don't take your hands off my shoulders so I can open the oven, you get to eat the burnt one." Langly sliced another bagel and swapped them, once Reid let go. "You're sick, okay. People are shitty when they're sick. And then they get better and they stop being shitty. And it's not like you only catch a cold once in your life. And you're looking at me like I'm out of my mind, and that tells me nobody else gets it. Except Villette; I promise he gets it. So, sit down, eat a bagel, and I'll make you some soup or something. You'll get better."  
  
There was a long pause while Langly stared at Reid and Reid stared at the floor, before Langly spoke again, gesturing with the knife he was using to cut bagels. "Or are you forgetting that I shit all over you, a few months ago?"  
  
Reid looked up, horrified. "That was different. You'd been abducted and tortured, and you were comatose, at the time."  
  
"Let's see, abducted and tortured, _check_ , and then you went back to work like ten minutes later, because nobody _knocked you unconscious_ , and I'm having a talk with Agent Mom about that, just for future reference. So, ah... No, I'm pretty sure I can handle you being whiny, uncommunicative, and mostly unconscious for two days. You're not dead. You're not dying. You just need to eat and sleep, like the rest of humanity." Langly pulled a container of dip out of one of the bags on the counter and shoved it at Reid. "And no. I'm not forgiving you, because you didn't _do_ anything."  
  
"I yelled at you about the car," Reid argued, somewhat petulantly.  
  
"No, you said you'd thank me for the car _later_ , when you were back in your right mind." Langly pulled another package out of the bag and dropped it on top of the tub of baba ghanouj. "And I called Penny and asked her what I'm supposed to be feeding you, and she said to get you chocolate almonds, because they'll get your brain working. And then I called Villette, and he said chile-garlic soup, and he's making it, so I'm supposed to go get it later. And no. I didn't tell either of them. Penny just knows you that well, and Villette's... well... he was _there_. All I told him was that I was _here_ , and he did that freaky brain-twins thing and informed me you were getting soup."  
  
He bent down and tossed another bagel from the broiler onto the counter, but didn't cut another to replace it. "Look, you freaked the fuck out, like anybody would. Love you or not, I _like you_ , so I'm here, and other people who like you have informed me of how I'm supposed to deal with you freaking the fuck out, because they've seen it before, and they know what I'm looking at. I get the impression Penny knew before _you_ did."  
  
"She didn't. I know when she knew, and I was already..." Reid put everything down on the counter and looked up, catching Langly's eye. "I had to go. You know why I had to go."  
  
"Because everybody treats you like you're twelve, and if you're not more badass than all of them, all the time, they're never going to take you seriously again." Langly reached past Reid to get the cream cheese and a less sharp knife with which to apply it to a bagel.  
  
"I wouldn't say 'never', but every time I am the least bit unwell, and I can't write it off as allergies or a headache... It takes too long to come back from that. Better I should just be tired. Better I should just not be thinking as clearly as usual because I have a headache. Because it's not just concern, there's a real undercurrent of fear, and unchecked that turns into either resentment or condescension. Because that is how people work, and I don't want any of it." Reid picked open the bag of almonds with one hand. "I don't want that between _us_."  
  
"It's not. Because you're fine. Minor malfunction upstairs. Took less time for you to be standing up and coherent than I was expecting." Langly shrugged and took a large bite of bagel, getting cream cheese on his nose. The next sentence was somewhat less intelligible, but a little interpretation suggested it might be, "Even you thought it would be tomorrow."  
  
Reid opened his mouth and Langly held up a finger.  
  
"And besides that, I don't need you to be _Superman_. I just need you to be not dead and more or less functional, most of the time." He poked Reid in the chest with the hand holding the bagel. "And you've got me beat on that, so don't even start. You spent a day on the couch. I've spent ... what, two and a half days in the hospital, and some more time in bed trying not to die, in the same amount of time? _Shit happens. It's the god damn job_. We're alive, and you're supposed to be eating something."  
  
Reid put an almond in his mouth and held up both hands, while he chewed. "Okay. Okay. Consider: I'm standing up and carrying on a conversation, but I'm not willing to discuss the idea that I don't have something to apologise for. Like the car, come back to it later. I don't promise I'm not still going to fight you on that one, but you're absolutely not going to win it now."  
  
"Do love a man who knows his own mind." Langly stopped and stared, putting down the remains of the bagel he was eating and wiping his hands off on his jeans. "Are you going to be weird if I... uh..."  
  
Reid watched the ensuing gestures for a moment, before he figured out what Langly was going for and stepped in closer, wrapping Langly in his arms. "Yes. I'm going to be totally and incomprehensibly weird, if you ask my co-workers what's normal for me."  
  
Langly snorted, pulling Reid closer. "What the hell do _they_ know, anyway?"


	2. Chapter 2

Breakfast was eaten standing in the kitchen, and Langly forgot to turn off the oven until they were both sweating from the heat and the cream cheese had gotten melty. Half a dozen bagels still sat on the counter, untoasted, when Langly picked up the cream cheese to toss it into the fridge, which he couldn't, because Reid was in the way.  
  
"It's hot," Reid observed, nudging Langly toward the living room.  
  
"Which is why the cream cheese has to go back in the fridge." Langly held up the container with an expectant look.  
  
"We should go be warm somewhere else," Reid decided, putting his hands on Langly's hips and turning with him, so Langly could reach the fridge. As soon as the door closed, he pulled Langly with him as he backed out of the kitchen. "My feet sticking to the linoleum was not on my list of things to have happen for the day."  
  
"You're not wearing socks." The thought occurred to Langly seconds before the fact that they were halfway across the living room, and he hadn't slammed his shin on the coffee table. But, he didn't glance to the side to figure out what strange magic this was, because he didn't want to take his eyes off Reid for any number of reasons.  
  
"Yeah, I noticed that. I also noticed I'm wearing pyjamas, and I have no memory of that happening." Reid sank down into the recliner, pulling Langly after him.  
  
Langly let himself be pulled, setting one knee to either side of Reid's hips and his hands against the back of the chair. "You sure about this?"  
  
"I'm sure there's a blanket next to your left foot, for when the heat disperses." Reid tipped his head back against the top of the chair and looked up at Langly. "Is that your objection or are you actually making sure I know what I'm doing?"  
  
"Hey, I have no objections to most things that end up with varying parts of my body mashed against a willing and enthusiastic hot fed, but, ah... I am, in fact, questioning your enthusiasm here."  
  
Reid blinked up at Langly, unimpressed. "I just dragged you out of the kitchen so I could curl up with you in the chair you bought me, and you're not sure if I'm up for this?"  
  
"You're temporarily fucking nuts. I'm just checking that all of the parts of your brain followed you down that rabbithole."  
  
"Did you ask me that Friday night?"  
  
"Nope."  
  
Reid waited expectantly for the other end of that thought, and eventually, Langly provided it.  
  
"Friday night, I went where you put me and did what you told me, because you were in no condition to be having second thoughts. You were barely in a condition to be having first thoughts, and if those entirely questionable first thoughts were that you wanted me somewhere you could hold on to me, I wasn't getting more than two feet from you, unless I had to get up to pee. Totally different situation." Langly finally gave into the pressure on his hip and settled onto Reid's lap. "Today, you're almost back, but you're not there yet. There's enough parts of your brain working to make you do dumb shit, and maybe not enough to realise it before you do it, case in point, my cream cheese."  
  
"I like cream cheese. Sometimes, I can have some. Some, which is not a lot, but it is definitely more than I managed to eat. I will admit that was your cream cheese, and I shouldn't have assumed I could have some." Reid reached up and put his fingertips on Langly's lips, as he saw the next sentence start. "No, I do know what I'm doing. I'm trying to pretend everything is normal until it _becomes_ normal. And I like to think this is a perfectly normal thing for us to be doing. And I like doing it. Two points for, but I'll hear arguments against."  
  
"I don't want to be on the wrong end of you regretting this later." Langly gave him a long, cautious look.  
  
"One, I'm not going to regret it, and two, if I did, I'll remind you this was my decision, and I'm entitled to kick _myself_ for any mistakes that I made, and that's pretty much what would happen. I'm not going to blame you, because I did something stupid. Doubly so after you took the time to argue with me about it." Reid finally let go of Langly's hips. "So, again, is this about _me_ or do you not want to be doing this?"  
  
Langly took off his glasses and handed them to Reid, before he leaned to the side and pulled the blanket up over his shoulders. "You know, I am pretty into you getting grabby with me."  
  
"Yeah?" A ghost of amusement came back into Reid's eyes, and he stretched until he could reach a precariously balanced table jammed against a bookcase, to set Langly's glasses on.  
  
"Yeah, it's about the closest thing to instant boner I'm gonna get at my age, which is a lot closer than I ever thought I'd get again." Langly paused, eyes darting awkwardly. "That's _flattery_ , not pressure."  
  
Reid slid his hands up Langly's thighs. "Come down here and flatter me some more. I think I could get used to it."  
  
"Oh, yeah?" Langly leaned down closer, purring against Reid's ear, as the hands continued to knead and caress his thighs. "You are the single hottest fed I have ever seen naked. Probably that I have ever touched in any way."  
  
"Lies," Reid retorted, amused. "Unless you're only counting federal agents and not all federal employees."  
  
Langly recoiled, pulled up by his suddenly straightening spine. "Who the hell else would there be?"  
  
A smile lingered on Reid's lips while he waited for the obvious to dawn on Langly.  
  
"We've been over this. It's not Villette."  
  
" _Byers_."  
  
"Oh. Well. I'm-- That's-- I wasn't-- He's not--" Langly sputtered.  
  
"So, were you only counting agents, then?" Reid teased, moving his hands up over Langly's hips, long fingers reaching around his waist, stretching down his back.  
  
"I'm going to go with yes. 'Yes' is how I can avoid any attempt to compare you to Byers, which would be the wrong thing to do, and I'm real damn clear about that." Langly managed an awkward smile.  
  
"I don't come out ahead in that comparison." Reid looked amused at the idea that Langly would think he didn't know that, by now. "But, I thought you were flattering me..."  
  
"Well, I was, until you dragged me into semantics!" Langly huffed and jabbed Reid in the shoulder with one finger.  
  
And Reid smiled fondly, bringing one hand up to twist the ends of Langly's hair around the tips of his fingers, absently stroking it with his thumb.  
  
Squinting suspiciously, Langly watched him for a long moment, wondering if he was about to get his hair pulled, but nothing happened. "What?"  
  
"Nothing! Everything." Reid held Langly in place by his hair and sat up just far enough to kiss his chin. " _You_." He took his hand back, uncertain. "Just you. I'm persistently amazed that you're still here, still with me, still enjoying the experience. ... Still alive."  
  
"Death by anything short of federal sex vampires is just not going to happen." Langly leaned back down and kissed Reid gently, cautiously, waiting to see what might happen. And then more words fell out of his mouth, as they occurred to him. "Of course, seeing as I survived the federal sex vampires so far, I think it's going to take more than that, but you know, if you want to try again..."  
  
Reid stole another kiss and sat back, looking up at Langly, almost unreadable. The moment stretched uncomfortably, until finally, he spoke. "I don't know. I might. Convince me with your wicked flattery and your unconquerable virtue." A smile crept across his face in the wake of the last words.  
  
"Tch. You just love me for my virtue." Langly tried to look disapproving, but the amusement tugged at his lips and sparkled in the corner of his eye.  
  
"There are a great many things I love about you, and however much I may appreciate your virtue and virility, they are merely a pleasant distraction." Reid's eyes looked dark enough to fall into, in the combination of shadows and the already-dim light. "I encourage you to use that for scale in framing my appreciation of everything else I like about you."  
  
"So, what you're saying is you're really understated, but anyone else who felt the way you do would be hanging on my arm and giggling at my every word?" A lopsided grin spread slowly across Langly's face. "I mean, that'd be great at cons, but I think I like you better. Means when you laugh at my jokes I'm actually funny, and you're not just looking for an invitation to appreciate my _virtue_."  
  
And Reid pulled Langly down, blanket and all, both arms wrapped around him. And for a moment, they just stayed like that, no words, just awkwardly-positioned warmth. "Langly?"  
  
"You want me to move my leg, don't you."  
  
"That, too," Reid admitted, "but not what I was going to say."   
  
Langly shifted to the side, tipping the chair back and waiting for Reid to get comfortable again. There were only so many positions one could be comfortable in, with two people in a recliner, no matter how large it was, and he was pretty sure they knew all of them, by that point. And sure enough, Reid ended up exactly where Langly expected.  
  
And then Reid apologised, again. "I'm sorry about yesterday."  
  
"Let me take this moment to assure you you're the only one of the two of us who gives a shit about yesterday. Oh, no, you let me cook in your kitchen and you needed about six naps. Gasp. The horror of it all. Oh, and maybe I brought you pyjamas, because you forgot what you were doing four times in a row, but is that really different from a bad case of project brain?" Langly shook his head, somewhat limitedly because of the angle, and tossed a leg over Reid's hip. "I think this is one of those things where it's worse to be it than it is to watch it. You're really pretty low-impact when you freak out, except for like three minutes about the car, and I had that coming. Don't surprise you, don't mess with your shit, and don't spend that much money on you. Got that. Real clear on that. But, it was kind of an emergency situation."  
  
"Not over the car, but I will be," Reid admitted, shifting down to curl up under Langly's chin. "Tomorrow, I go back to work. I'll be driving it. I'll appreciate it more after I've driven it while I'm not already, well... _stressed_."  
  
"Driving in DC morning traffic is kind of the definition of stress," Langly teased, just enjoying the warmth and the fact that Reid was talking to him again, in complete sentences that didn't sound like they'd been assembled in a blender.  
  
"Most days, I'd rather be bumper to bumper than on the Metro. The longer I work this job, the more I understand the mechanics of mass murder and terrorist attacks on public transit, and the less I want to actually use it." Reid's entire body tensed as he curled up closer against Langly's chest. "I don't want to be that close to that many people, and I really don't want to be that close to that many people when the panic hits during or after an attack."  
  
"People are like cows. You freak them out, and they trample you." Langly shuddered and elbowed the button for the vibrating seat to cover it. "A stampede in a closed space."  
  
Reid swallowed audibly. "Weren't you flattering me?"  
  
"I keep trying to, but _someone_ keeps changing the subject." Langly made the effort to sound exactly as offended as he should've been. "Someone incredibly sexy, who is only _slightly_ less superhuman than he first appears, but is still a completely mindblowing experience, even with pants on."  
  
"Even with pants on?" Reid echoed, still much too burnt out to play, but willing to try. At worst, he'd shut down and fall asleep again. At best, well, he'd fall asleep intentionally, and without breaking anything else. A bit of a gamble, but a potentially enjoyable one, if he could just keep a grip on how to enjoy things, which was occasionally difficult even on good days, which this was not. Except it could have been. It should have been. He had everything to be happy about -- the case was over, his car was fixed, he was home, his weirdly enjoyable boyfriend was warm and not leaning on any organs he was trying to use for their intended purposes -- but, he hadn't been right in a week or more, and it would be another few hours, if he was lucky. But, things were looking up.  
  
"Hey, just because I appreciate you with no pants doesn't mean I can't appreciate you fully dressed!" Langly protested, a sharp fingertip nudging one of those vital organs. "I liked you with pants on, first, even after I figured out you were a fed and you didn't know how to use chopsticks."  
  
"I understand chopsticks perfectly well, in theory. It's the implementation I struggle with."  
  
"You mean like folding chairs?" Langly drawled, pressing a kiss to the top of Reid's head in self-defence. It was harder to get cracked in the teeth like that.  
  
"I don't--" And then the implication caught up. "There were extenuating circumstances. I don't usually have someone I don't know trying to kiss me while I'm sitting in a folding chair, for certain values of sitting."  
  
"I didn't think you were going to _turn your head_." Langly snorted and buried his face in Reid's hair. "Anyway, that didn't scare you off, so here we are, like ten months and two major holidays later, and you're worried I'm going to freak out because you're having a shitty couple of days. Please. You're not even _doing_ anything. And if this is you being _shitty_ , you just got like ten times hotter, which I didn't think was possible, but you keep surprising me."  
  
"Flattery will get you everywhere I was already planning to go with you," Reid purred, stretching his leg between Langly's thighs. "What time is it?"  
  
"You'd be at work already," Langly admitted.  
  
"Has my phone been--"  
  
"You unplugged one and turned off the other one, on Friday." What Langly didn't mention was how many calls he'd still backtraced as they came in. Nothing serious. Penny. Villette. _He'd_ called both of them back, because Reid wasn't going to do it. It was nothing but idle concern. Nothing was on fire. Nobody needed anything.  
  
He decided to try admitting to it. "If there was anything about your mother, you know I'd wake you up, right?"  
  
That took a moment to sink in, and Reid tensed, trying to decide how much he cared. "Thank you. You're not keeping things from me. I'm keeping things from me. You just have the ability to override me if something is the kind of important that has to be handled immediately."  
  
"You know if the shit hit the fan, I'd have called Villette, right? Yesterday, I'm not sure you could've done much more than eat toast and stare into space, if the house was on fire. You're looking better. You sound better."  
  
"I'm not good, but I'm better," Reid agreed, turning over that series of sentences. "Why would you think--"  
  
"Because he has root access to your _brain_ , and he could either extract the data or hard reset you so you'd work for a few minutes."  
  
Reid worked his way through that from one end to the other and back. It might not be the worst thing if it were true, if Chaz could put him back in his own head for at least a little while. But, that's all it would be, he knew, a little while. It would be procrastination, and not a fix. No, what almost bothered him was that Langly knew enough to think it. And yet, the context was that Langly wanted to make sure his mother would be protected -- that was the only thing he'd thought was important enough to bring into the carefully sealed envelope Reid had put himself in. And that wasn't a priority he could fault.  
  
But, he could absolutely and wholly irrationally fault the idea of giving Chaz anything about his mother.  
  
He thought he might get over that, but it really _would_ require an emergency.  
  
"Boston." He changed the subject. "Are we going to Boston for Easter, or do you think, if she's still well, I should have her come down?"  
  
"Are you completely out of your fucking mind?" Langly paused, realising what he'd just said. "Okay, stupid question, right now you _are_ out of your mind. Take two. Sure, let's go to Boston, but this time I'm making reservations for second breakfast and maybe dinner."  
  
"That's a 'don't bring her down', isn't it." Reid shifted back and looked up at Langly. "I'm only asking you because you've met her, and I'm not at a point where I should be making significant decisions without consulting, yet."  
  
"All I'm going to say about your mother is that you should count your coffee cups. That's it. I don't live here. She's your problem, not mine, but--" Langly gestured from the elbow, pointing at the kitchen, "--count your coffee cups."  
  
"Merciless, but probably accurate. Her condition's improved since then, but I don't know that it's improved enough to have her in my space, again. I've gotten a little lax about my paperwork, and I know she's going to start cleaning within fifteen minutes of coming through the door."  
  
"You mean she's going to re-arrange your file cabinets."  
  
"Absolutely not. All the file drawers are locked, _for a reason_. But, I do have to stop putting the mail on my desk, when I come in, but when I lock it in my pencil drawer, I forget to go through it."  
  
"Right. We're going to Boston. Leaving... Friday, back on Monday? I'm handling the flight, because you're not getting me on another commercial flight. One was dangerous enough."  
  
"That seems a little excessive..." Reid protested.  
  
"It seems like a very nice hotel, and me packing clean sheets," Langly retorted. "And I'm buying cherries and champagne, because I want to watch you tie cherry stems in a knot again, but also because you hogged all the champagne last time."  
  
"Is Easter really a champagne holiday?" Reid asked, cautiously curling back under Langly's chin.  
  
"It is now." Langly snorted. "Do I get more laid if I prove I was paying enough attention to give it a religious explanation?"  
  
"More laid than you're getting right now? Possibly. More laid in terms of the general duration or intensity than is usual for us, I'm not sure either of us would survive."


	3. Chapter 3

As it turned out, nobody got laid, right then. Instead, Reid fell asleep, again, mumbling incoherently against Langly's neck.  
  
By the time he woke, the sun had moved, and Langly was still warm and heavy, sprawled across him in a position he didn't remember being in, but he let that go and held onto the warmth. He could smell Langly's skin, and the scent wound through his mind, coiling into memories -- that skin pressed against him, kisses that tasted like stale coffee, the sight of Langly asleep next to him, hair tangled across the pillow, the sight of Langly arched over him, anything but asleep...  
  
Reid decided not to finish waking up, to let go of thoughts about grocery shopping and obligations to other people, and press his lips against whatever skin he could reach. As they'd demonstrated on a few notable occasions, there were things neither of them needed to be awake for, and he wanted the comfort of this half-asleep, muffled sensation more than anything that being awake could offer him. This wasn't just good enough, it was good. It was great. It would be so much better if he could shut up the part of his brain that had just woken up, and was peppering him with guilt and necessity.  
  
Then Langly stirred, half-woken from the seemingly infinite kisses, and with an inquisitive sound he pressed his thigh more firmly against Reid, whose leg wound around it. A contented sound followed, as he flexed that thigh a few times, letting Reid's hips roll against it.  
  
Somewhere in those first moments, Reid realised this wasn't going to be the languid unspooling of warm desire he'd expected, that _Langly_ fairly clearly still expected. He was slow, they both knew it. He was a tease. He took his time. But, right now, every touch felt like lightning, and his skin buzzed with it. The pressure of Langly's thigh felt so good it almost hurt. Maybe it did hurt. Maybe he didn't care. And the inside of his mind got louder and louder, the physical desire like a constant howling and the reminders of all the things he could've -- should've -- been doing getting sharper and crueller.  
  
But, it was as if his body was only taking external input -- none of the demands on his mind or his time made the slightest impact against the pleasure that crashed through him, and his mind tried to fill the wake of each wave with guilt. Later. It would catch later, and he'd drown in it, but for now he was lustful and Langly was oh so willing.  
  
"I want you," Reid panted, as his leg tensed and one shoulder twisted itself back.  
  
"Tell me," Langly breathed, wholly taken with the idea that he might not be first, this time.  
  
"I want you right now, just like this. I want--" Reid shuddered, his hands clutching Langly's shirt. "I just want _you_."  
  
He writhed -- there was no other word for it. His head pressed back and his leg tensed again, and he could feel the asynchronous tension twisting him, just before he lost track of the ends and middles of most of his nerves. There was sensation, and he had no idea where it was coming from, and he supposed it didn't matter, just that it felt this good, this incredible, this breathtakingly perfect.  
  
And then the guilt slammed down on the back of his neck in a way that defied the laws of physics, but if there was one thing he'd learned, it was that psychology and physics had very little to do with each other. He curled forward, almost sitting up, but Langly was in the way.  
  
Langly pulled back from the unexpected impact, still dizzy with desire, but convinced he'd leaned wrong on Reid, pinched a nerve, crushed something... He looked down, first. Not that. Probably. "Hey, you okay?"  
  
"I will be." Reid's hand slid up the inside of Langly's thigh, fingers tucked between his legs, palm pressed against his crotch. But, he didn't look up at Langly.  
  
"Ah, yeah, I don't think I'm gonna, if you're not--" Langly made a strangled sound as Reid's hand flexed and rolled. "Okay, maybe I am, but--"  
  
Another strangled sound and Langly's back bowed, hands gripping the top of the chair. He panted and shivered, eyeing Reid with something that might've been confused annoyance. "So, before I accuse you of the kind of demonic possession that only happens in japanimation videos involving girls' schools and tentacles, you want to tell me what the hell is going on here?"  
  
"Two things." Reid took his hand back, fingers curling in as he held it against his chest. He looked up as high as Langly's shoulder, trying to figure out where to start. "Three." He looked up. "I needed to finish what I started, even if I couldn't do that the way I wanted to."  
  
"Warn a guy, huh?" Langly chided, still catching his breath.  
  
Reid's already-distant face fell further, and he looked away again. "Sorry. I shouldn't have--"  
  
"No. Uh-uh. No way." Langly put a hand on Reid's chin and tugged at his face until he looked up. "No, Reid, you do not get to feel bad about giving me the fantastic orgasm I was expecting to have. That is not a thing we're doing. Just... I thought I kneed you in the junk or something."  
  
Realisation and a whole other apology broke across Reid's face. "Oh, no. No, that wasn't you. I'm... I really have to get up, now. I said there were two things, and there are, and the first thing is that I've been neglecting my work, my home, _myself_ , for days now, and I need to take care of some things before it gets any later. I need to stop this before it gets any worse." He caught Langly's wrist as the hand moved away from his face. "And the other thing... the other thing, if you're up for it, when I'm done... I want you to take me to bed. Your bed, our bed, it doesn't matter. I want you to take me to bed, and I want you to..." His eyes turned uncertain, and he let go of Langly's wrist. "We'll talk about it when we get there. If that's something you--"  
  
"You in a bed with me. That's the important part of the sentence." Langly pressed a kiss to the side of Reid's head and got up, still a little shaky. "Look, are you going to be okay if I run over to Villette's and pick up the soup? You take care of whatever you need to, and I'll come back with dinner. Lunch. Whatever that meal is by the time I get back."  
  
"Are you taking my car?" Reid asked, pushing himself out of the chair and stepping carefully around Langly to get to his desk.  
  
"Nah, I had Allie bring back the bike for me, when I went to get your car from the airport." Langly offered a lopsided smile. "I knew I'd have to get home somehow."  
  
Reid nodded, picking through the stack of mail on his desk. Langly must have gotten it yesterday, while he was asleep. "Go get the soup. Tell Chaz I'll come see him tomorrow, if I'm not halfway across the continent before lunch. I know where I am, and I can promise you this is almost over."  
  
"You say this like working with you passed out in my lap is some crazy inconvenience, which it's not, especially now that I don't have to be able to reach the keyboard." Langly grinned and grabbed his jacket and helmet from a chair by the table. "Kind of like having a cat. You're warm and in my lap, and when I pet you, you make these little rumbly noises and knead my leg. And I'm absolutely telling Villette all of that."  
  
Reid looked up just in time to see Langly slip out the door, almost slamming his hair in it. He supposed it wouldn't be the worst thing Chaz knew about him.

* * *

By the time Langly returned, Reid almost looked like himself again. He was obviously recently out of the shower, still damp and wearing his bathrobe, as he sat at the desk, working his way through the stack of paper that had built up in his absence. Bills, other bills, a few articles to review -- nothing unexpected. He'd half hoped for and half feared a letter from his mother, but there wasn't one. He knew he should write, instead of just showing up, but he hated to get her hopes up, in case he didn't make it.  
  
Panic raced through him as the door unlocked, but he knew before it opened that it would be Langly -- it was the middle of the day on a weekend. No one who didn't belong there would be _that fundamentally stupid_. And yet, he still considered the distance to the bathroom and realised he wasn't quite as intact as he'd like to be, in that moment. He wondered how long it would take, this time. He wondered if he'd ever be over it, this time. And he supposed it didn't matter, as long as he didn't _look_ jumpy.  
  
He didn't get up, when Langly came in, pretending to still be absorbed in his work, until Langly put a plastic bag down in the middle of the page. _Then_ , he looked up inquisitively.  
  
"Lunch. Well, your lunch. _My_ lunch is in my other hand. You know how Villette cooks. I had to stop and have a tart, while he bitched about pie crust and broken ribs being a bad combination." There was a thump that sounded like very full tupperware hitting the floor, as Langly came around the desk and leaned down to give Reid a kiss. "And he wanted me to give you that, but this next one's just for me."  
  
Another kiss followed, lingering, close-mouthed, and anything but chaste. Reid wound his fingers into Langly's hair, just to feel it, his other hand trying to find a way to pull Langly closer. But, the kiss broke when Langly slammed a knee on the arm of the wooden chair.  
  
"Listen, you're skinny, I'm skinny, and this is still not a chair to have sex in." Langly rubbed his knee absently. "You still want me to carry you off to bed and ravish you, or did you want lunch first?"  
  
"That's not what I said," Reid protested, half-heartedly.  
  
"You never finished saying what you said, but I'm pretty sure that's what you _meant_." Langly stepped back, his hair sliding away from Reid's fingers. "You going to tell me you don't want it?"  
  
Reid peered at the bag on his desk, around Langly's arm, and completely avoided the question. "Is the soup still hot?"  
  
"The soup is in a microwave-safe container."  
  
Looking up at Langly, Reid finally asked the most important question. "Do you _want_ to carry me off to bed, and, ah... ravish me?"  
  
Langly looked completely unimpressed. "Uh, hm, let me see, do I want to have hot sex with my hot boyfriend in a giant bed that has a coffee maker right next to it? Yeah, I dunno, I have to think about that." He paused dropping his offended gaze to Reid's eyes. "No, of course not, because I'm a god damn idiot. What the hell kind of question is that?"  
  
"The kind of question asked by your boyfriend who has just had a multi-day dissociative episode and doesn't want to assume everything has returned to normal while he wasn't looking." Reid offered a faint smile, one eyebrow lifting slightly. "But, if you're going to carry me off, you probably want to open the door before you try to pick me up."  
  
"Nothing ever left normal. You just slept through it. And, okay, _that_ wasn't normal. That was a little weird, but you're sitting up, you're halfway through the mail, and you want to screw, so I'm pretty sure you're okay." Langly shrugged and dumped his jacket on the recliner. "And, you know, I designed that door so I could open it with my foot."  
  
"I weigh more than you remember I do, every time you pick me up, which is interesting because it really highlights how infrequently it happens. It is much more often the other way around." Reid's face remained nearly still, but the amusement was clear in his eyes.  
  
"Maybe you're just getting heavier," Langly teased, tugging Reid out of the chair by his wrists.  
  
"I blame Chaz, if that's the case, but I don't think I am." Reid shrugged and let himself be swept up into Langly's arms. "My clothes still fit."  
  
Langly wheezed and braced himself, trying to get a better grip, which he eventually managed, staggering the few feet to the bookcase-door without slamming Reid's feet into any of the furniture. He kicked around for the trigger button. "Why do I never remember you weigh more than I do?"  
  
"Because you keep hoping I don't." Reid didn't laugh. He didn't even breathe too deeply, not wanting to be dropped. "You really can put me down. It's fine. I'm not actually going to be disappointed."  
  
The latch clicked open, and Langly pulled the lever out with his heel, sending the bookcase coasting into the next room. "Nah. You're not _that_ heavy. I'm just not used to picking people up."  
  
Reid held on as Langly crossed the room, one careful step after another. "Haven't you carried _Byers_ to bed? I'm sure he weighs more than I do."  
  
"He does," Langly admitted."But, it's different. I'm usually drunk enough I can't feel it until the next day. _He's_ usually wasted." He dropped to his knees at the foot of the bed, depositing Reid on the edge of it. "Gimmie a minute," he panted.  
  
"Are you okay?" Reid rolled off of Langly's arms and untangled the bathrobe from them and himself. "I remember this going better, last time."  
  
"And it'll go better next time. I slammed my toe on the corner of the bed." Langly looked up with an awkward half-smile. "You going to get naked, or are you waiting for me to rip your clothes off?"  
  
"Please keep the buttons attached. I like these pyjamas."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *gasp* Can it be? I'm seeing two new names in the kudos! *waves* Hello people I don't know! May I suggest the rest of this completely ridiculous series? As everybody else here knows, fans of this abject mayhem have gathered on Discord and [Pillowfort](https://www.pillowfort.social/community/Vexation%20of%20Spirit), and more party people are always welcome in the house. ~~Discord invites are available by request in the comments or there's a public invite on the PF community. Pillowfort invites are also available by request in the comments, because I have about a billion of them.~~


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The internet is for porn. So it is, and so it shall be.

Langly had set his glasses on a shelf before he threw his shirts across the room and toed off his shoes and socks, climbing up the bed over where Reid sprawled, still wrapped in his bathrobe. Reid smiled up almost coyly, a subtle challenge and a definite invitation, which Langly met by throwing open the bathrobe and knocking Reid's hands aside. He raised an imperious eyebrow and burst out laughing, folding down over Reid to press a kiss to his forehead.  
  
"Tell me you weren't actually looking forward to being the brave and virginal princess again..."  
  
The sentence startled a surprised laugh out of Reid. "Ah, that-- I am... It hadn't actually crossed my mind, so no, in fact, that was not what I was looking forward to." He paused, awkwardly, cheeks tight in something that could've been a squint if his eyes had bothered to play along. "I'm... I know you've told me that we're fine, that things are okay between us, but..." Here, he felt like an idiot, a desperate idiot, even. "Show me?"  
  
It was desperate, pathetic, and manipulative, and he regretted it and resented himself immediately. He twisted his arm between them and put a hand on Langly's chest, forestalling any answer with a gentle push. "I'm sorry. That was not in any way appropriate, and it is not something I should've said. It is not something I should've brought into this."  
  
Langly looked down at Reid, squinting with his glasses off, blinking in annoyance. He shifted his weight and brought up one hand thwacking Reid firmly in the forehead with his middle finger. "You were sick. You felt like shit, you looked like shit, and you got this weird idea that you pissed me off, which you didn't, but you're going to if you don't _knock that the hell off_. But, now, you're feeling better, looking better, and you said you wanted to screw. And you are absolutely welcome to back out of that, but what I need to know is whether you're going to use that ticket to Pound Town, or if I should put my shirt back on."  
  
"Well, I'm definitely not going to, if you say 'Pound Town' again." Both his eyebrows arched up, leaving Reid looking prim and less than thrilled. "But, if you can refrain, I would very much like to do... something like that."  
  
Langly squinted suspiciously, as if expecting Reid to say something else thwap-worthy, but when it didn't happen, he lowered his hand to Reid's chest, thumbing open the buttons on the pyjama top. "You're lucky I like you."  
  
"I am," Reid agreed, the hand on Langly's chest turning and sliding down to open the buttons on his jeans. "And I think it every day." As he hit the last button, he slid his hand into Langly's jeans cupping him through the cloth of his well-worn boxers. "Are you sure you don't want to put your shirt back on for this?"  
  
"Finally." Langly rolled his eyes and ducked his head to kiss Reid's forehead, again. "Now, you've got your concerns in the right place. But, no. I think I'm all right. We've got enough sheets if I'm not." He paused. "You're okay?"  
  
"I'm fine."  
  
"You're _really_ okay?"  
  
"Langly, I'm fine." Reid knew he wasn't fine, but he was working on it. He put on a good show of it, and that's really what was important. If he could just keep reminding himself what 'fine' looked like, it would come back to him. And this was the next step. He flexed his hand, pressing his palm a little harder against Langly's flesh, and he could feel the faint twitch in response to the pressure. "I'm home. You're here. For the moment, we're safe. And I want you."  
  
Langly watched the desire float to the top. Whatever else might be going on, behind Reid's eyes, that's what showed in them. He raised his foot, carefully, still supporting himself with one hand and spreading the pyjama top off of Reid's chest with the other, and hooked his toe in the waistband of Reid's pyjama bottoms. He shoved down, caught the waistband on Reid's other hip, and ended up tipping himself forward, dropping his chest on Reid's face as he fell.  
  
Under him, Reid laughed, somewhat hysterically, against his ribs.  
  
"Can we just pretend I didn't just do that?" Langly asked, pushing himself back up and sitting up to slide Reid's pyjama bottoms off with his _hands_ , like a sensible person. Which he really wasn't, and he knew he wasn't, and he wasn't about to start pretending now.  
  
"No, because then something else will go wrong," Reid argued, as the motion dislodged his hand from Langly's jeans. "It's not really us, unless something's gone wrong, and that's a nice mild misjudgement. We should hold onto that, lest we progress to something painful."  
  
Langly tipped his head and nodded. "That's a pretty good reason."  
  
Reid drew one knee up, crossing it over the other thigh. One hand held onto his bare hip and the other curled loosely on the bed above his head. He looked up at Langly's reverent stillness and knew he was being photographed, and his first instinct was to object, to pull the sides of the thrown-open bathrobe together, but he knew the care Langly took of his data, and he knew no one else would ever see it, except maybe Chaz.  
  
Langly finally moved, his fingers tracing the long lines of Reid's leg up to the hip his hand rested on. And Langly tugged at that hand, loosening the grip, until he could hold the fingers with his own. And he stayed like that a long moment, before he realised he wasn't going to say anything -- an odd state of affairs -- and leaned down to press his lips to the middle of Reid's chest.   
  
"I love you." The words were quiet enough that for a moment, Reid wasn't certain they'd actually left his mouth, but he could feel them in his lips, so they probably had. Bringing his other hand down, he wrapped a lock of Langly's hair around one finger, letting it uncoil off the end of his finger as he brought the hand back up.  
  
"And I will never be sure what you see in me, but I'm going to enjoy it until you get new glasses," Langly teased, littering more kisses across Reid's chest, feeling Reid's grip shift to meet his own, so then they were holding on to each other.  
  
"I want you," Reid said again, trying to get one leg past Langly, trying to subtly make a point about how he wanted this to go.  
  
And Langly pulled himself up to face-height and lifted his hips out of the way of that leg. "Tell me."  
  
"Kiss me," Reid demanded, tipping his chin up ever so slightly. "I want to feel your lips. I want you to make me warm. I want to know we're both alive, and I'm not _dreaming_."  
  
As thin as those lips were, Reid could appreciate the smile on them as they met his own, the amused breath that spilled over his chin. They'd gotten good at kissing each other, he thought, as his lips parted just enough for Langly to nip at his lip, to suck and lick at the ragged skin in a way that brought a response from his thigh, which rubbed against Langly's jeans. And as the kiss went on, he realised he hadn't had the opportunity to consider how that would feel against the bare insides of his thighs. It felt good, now, but if it went on too long, he was probably going to end up with exactly the sort of chafe he didn't want to have to explain. Going back to work _walking funny_ was not going to be a good plan.  
  
But, for now, it was different. It was oddly exciting. It was something he'd been on the other side of often enough in this relationship, and it was probably about time.  
  
The open buttons of those jeans pressed against his bare skin were a little more common, and always cold for a few minutes, but he could feel his flesh respond to the sensation. His body knew what that meant, and he agreed with the skittering flickers along his nerves -- this was a good idea, and he wanted more.  
  
There was airspace between them, but that was all. Well, there was space enough for Langly's hand, and that was probably wider than air, but the heat still gathered quickly, and both that hand and the skin it caressed were sweaty almost immediately. He flicked a thumb across Reid's nipple and felt Reid's gasp pull the air out of his lungs.  
  
"Yeah?" Langly murmured against Reid's lips.  
  
"Like you mean it," Reid challenged, and this time the sweep of thumb caught his nipple against a knuckle, and he arched and shuddered, wrapping one leg around Langly's. "I want you. I want you every way you want to have me." He nudged Langly up with one finger, to look him in the eye. "And just because that is a terrifying sentence, it's not less true."  
  
"I'm not going to break you," Langly promised.  
  
"I know that, or I'd be a lot more careful." Reid swallowed, twisting the ends of Langly's hair around his fingertips. "I'm serious. Anything you want from me... _in bed_."  
  
"Literal bed or figurative bed?"  
  
"Figurative bed." Reid squinted up at Langly, trying to guess where this was going, and whether it was going to involve another walk by the river. "What are you thinking?"  
  
"You remember the first time? In my bathroom?" Langly looked at anything that wasn't Reid and tipped his head to the side when he couldn't quite shrug with the shoulder that was supporting his weight. "That. Only with less pants."  
  
"Leave yours on?" Reid suggested, looking as innocent as he could manage in the midst of such debauchery. "I think I owe you one, and I think we'd both enjoy it here."  
  
"You know how much I like that."  
  
"I might." The lazy stretch that rubbed him firmly against Langly's hip did nothing to disrupt the innocent look on Reid's face. "Or I might just want to feel the buttons digging into the back of my thigh as a reminder that I couldn't wait that long to have your penis inside me."  
  
Langly's eyes drifted shut, and his hand clenched in the sheets next to Reid's ear. "Jesus christ, Reid. Jesus _christ_." He took a shaky breath. "Give me a minute or my dick's not going to make it to the wall."  
  
"How did you last so long that first time? You haven't done it, since."  
  
Langly cleared his throat and half-opened one eye. "My dick was caught in my pants in the most excruciating possible way for like half of that. Also, you know, completely fucking terrified about touching the fed's federally-disavowed dick. Not that I didn't want to fuck, but that clocked a solid one point oh on the Susanne scale of what the hell am I doing with my life."  
  
"The right thing, I hope," Reid said, quietly.  
  
"You. I'm doing you. And I'm pretty happy about that, _now_." Langly rolled Reid's nipple between his thumb and knuckle, waiting for the shiver and the little muffled squeak, before he put that hand back on the bed. "Come on, hold onto me. You're lighter like this."  
  
"No, you just have a better grip," Reid argued, stretching for one of the shelves and patting it until he found the two things he was looking for. He slipped one into each of Langly's pants pockets -- his pants being open helped with that -- and then wrapped his arms around Langly's neck and his legs around Langly's waist. "Let's see how long you last this time."  
  
"I'm hoping I can even get it in." Langly edged back toward the foot of the bed, until he could get his feet on the floor, and then staggered at the sudden shift in weight.  
  
"Check your left pocket."  
  
"Yeah, great, the lube. That's the solution to a different problem." Langly huffed and stumbled to the side, leaning in to get Reid's back against the short wall beside the bed.  
  
Reid hit the wall hard enough that his back twinged, and he wasted a moment making sure that was his back and not an echo of Chaz's. But, no, that was too close to the spine to be Chaz. "No, your other left."  
  
"That's _your_ left." Langly rolled his eyes.  
  
"No, the _lube_ is on _my_ left."  
  
Reid could feel Langly's thumbs twitch, one and then the other.  
  
"God damn it. You're right, that's not my left." Langly moved himself closer to both Reid and the wall, trying to free up the right hand, which was his left hand. Slipping a finger into his pocket, he found what Reid had put there. "Yeah?"  
  
"Absolutely."  
  
"I'm afraid of dropping you. We're not good at doing this standing up." The first time, he thought, was the only time neither of them fell. Except that time by the river, and he'd been distracted, that time, because of Bollinger.  
  
"Yes, but if you fall, and you're leaning toward me, we're just going to slide down the wall. You might bang your knee, but you're not really going to _drop_ me." Reid stroked Langly's face gently, realising then that his fingertips were smudged from handling the mail so soon out of the shower. And that was disgusting, but on some level -- many levels -- so was what he was about to do.  
  
Langly was looking down into the space between them, trying to get the ring to sit here he wanted it instead of where it wanted to be, and he was grateful once again that he was thin enough for Reid to use his hips for balance.  
  
"Weren't we going to do this in an elevator?" Reid tipped his head back as the gap between them closed. "I seem to recall that coming up, and we never got around to it."  
  
Langly shivered as he flipped open the lube, dousing his hand, stroking it on, and running his slick fingertips over the warm skin between Reid's widely-parted thighs. "Yeah, we were. But, then you got shot."  
  
"Well, that was rude of me," Reid teased, rocking his hips against the pressure of Langly's fingers. "Maybe next time."  
  
Langly purred against Reid's ear, nipping and sucking at the side of his neck. "In the elevator, where you work. In a federally-owned elevator, in the middle of all that security... I'll take out the cameras, before I put my hands all over you."  
  
"Just so we're clear, I'm absolutely not _taking my pants off_ in an elevator. Anything short of that is probably negotiable." The words came out a bit breathless, and Reid tipped his head to give Langly more room.  
  
"Then we'll do it the other way, and you can pound my ass until I can't stand up." For a moment, it crossed Langly's mind that he was almost definitely giving Reid a hickey, and in that moment, he decided he just didn't care. "I'd offer, but we haven't managed to make that good, yet."  
  
"No, we haven't," Reid agreed, knees digging into Langly's ribs as his legs tightened.  
  
"Breathe," Langly warned, and Reid relaxed as much as he could without letting go.  
  
Langly's fingers slid into him, unfortunately a little cold, but Reid's shiver wasn't from the temperature. As the desire overtook his nerves, he took stock of the situation: he was a little less than half-dressed, still wearing a bathrobe that hung between him and the wall, with his legs both bent up and wrapped around a surprisingly attractive man, who was admittedly intent on and doing an excellent job of pleasuring him. And yet, even that wasn't enough that he couldn't spot the inherent ridiculousness of the situation, of the pose he found himself in, of the very nature of fucking, in the abstract. It was ridiculous, he was probably going to put a crick in his hip, his knee was already going numb, and he just wanted more.  
  
"Now which one of us is the tease?"   
  
Langly laughed, face still buried against Reid's neck. "You."  
  
There was a gasp and a sputter, "Me!? Wha-- How-- I--" and then another finger pressed in and the next gasp was a lot less offended.  
  
"Now," Reid demanded, his legs tensing uselessly, one twisting further out, leaving him all the more precariously pinned between Langly and the wall. "I want you _right now_. Impale me on your shaft like the boar upon the pike, and when you draw your spear from me, let me bear a hole enough to fit an apple."  
  
"I think you want Villette for that," Langly breathed, both hands occupied as Reid's tense limbs provided just as much hindrance as help. It occurred to him, as he finally felt the tip catch, sending a shiver down his spine, that Reid was usually incredibly averse to violent metaphor in the bedroom. And then he slid in, and the thought was gone, right along with his vision and the better part of his control.  
  
As he drove himself in, again and again, he realised that the feeling of going deeper with every thrust wasn't an illusion, but the shifting angle of Reid's hips, and he moved one arm to catch Reid's knee over his forearm, to better hold him in place. He didn't think he'd lasted seconds, and the half-coherent filthy pleading in his ear wasn't helping him hold off another, despite the fact he was increasingly sure that after two, he had to sit down. Or maybe just lay down and lift his hips before the third.  
  
But, he could feel every breath his thrusts forced out of Reid's body, like this. He could feel the way Reid's hands clutched and scrabbled at his shoulders, his neck, his back. He was rock hard, his hot boyfriend wanted a rough fuck, and he was going to deliver if it meant they ended up in a heap on the floor. Or maybe he could just lean past the corner, so they'd hit the bed and keep going. As it stood, Langly was absolutely sure 'keep going' was an essential part of the moment.  
  
Reid, though, was right on the edge and had stopped there, peering over it, desperately. This was good, but it wasn't _enough_. It wasn't what he needed, even with the sound of Langly halfway there -- halfway to a second, he thought. But, as close as they were, there was still too much distance between them. There wasn't enough skin on his skin; there wasn't enough pressure where he needed it. There just wasn't enough and he needed more, he _wanted_ more.  
  
"Isn't working," he muttered.  
  
"Tell me," Langly breathed, already considering the need for a different position.  
  
"The bed. Gravity works, and I'm falling." Reid shuddered and clamped down, blunt nails skidding across Langly's skin. His thighs finally pulled in, instead of twisting out like they had been, and for the moment he had a death grip on Langly's waist plus one arm.  
  
Langly made a strangled sound and leaned in harder, fingers digging into Reid's flesh. One shaking breath and then another followed. "Okay," he panted. "Really, seriously hold on to me. Two steps to the side and back down."  
  
Reid made a sound he'd never name, but true to his word, Langly got them back to the bed without dropping him, and more surprisingly without pulling out. He clutched a knee to his shoulder, to keep his hips tipped up, the other leg still caught on Langly's arm. He was about as naked as he could be while still wearing clothes, and the way Langly's eyes lingered on his body lit a fire in his nerves just as much as it made him want to pull the blanket over himself. Still. He was starting to think that would always be the case.  
  
But, then Langly leaned down, eyes on his face, studying every line of it, curious, concerned, desirous. "Better?"  
  
Reid nodded and pulled Langly down those last few inches into a kiss, an intoxicating shared breath, flecked with muffled sounds of desire and desperation. But, he was still in the wrong position, and this wasn't going to work, as much as he wanted it to. As much as he wanted to be wanted like this, to be taken like this, folded almost in half with the buttons of Langly's jeans digging into the back of his leg. It was good -- it was so good -- and he wanted so much for it to be right--  
  
The sound he made was inhuman, when Langly's hand pressed between them, slick fingers gently squeezing and slowly stroking. This was perfect. This was so good the top of his head felt loose and he lost contact with his fingertips. He was full of stars, and he could feel them spinning, glittering down his nerves; he could taste them on his tongue. It was so good. It was ideal. He found himself infinite and desperate. He needed everything this was on him and inside him, and he saw the sky and the spires of a palace that never was, before he found himself blinded by the sunlight from the back of his eyelids.  
  
Above him, Langly tensed again, but Reid had lost count. The kiss broke, finally, as Langly's lips slid down the side of his face, fresh air racing into his lungs as he panted.  
  
By the time he could breathe, Reid was exhausted, and he let go of one leg, the shift pushing Langly almost out of him. "Langly?"  
  
"Hmm?"  
  
"I love you. Don't let me treat you like I don't."  
  
Langly pushed himself up far enough to see Reid's face and slid the rest of the way out as he untangled his arm from Reid's leg. "Uh, yeah, the day you do that, I'll let you know."  
  
"I mean it," Reid insisted, feeling himself suddenly empty and slightly cold.  
  
"Yeah, so do I." Langly sat the rest of the way up, kneeling on the very edge of the bed, and worked the ring off, tossing it onto a shelf as he reached for the tissues to wipe off Reid's chest.  
  
Reid shot him an apologetic look, trying to get his fingers to take the tissue away, so he could do that himself. "I think I need to go back to sleep."  
  
"Uh, yeah? I'd be surprised if you didn't after that." Langly grinned and tossed the tissues off the bottom of the bed. He'd get them later. "And I'm probably taking a nap, too, because I am willing to do just about anything not to have to stand up again, right now."  
  
"We should move up. My feet are sticking off the end of the bed." Reid shrugged out of the pyjama top and bathrobe as he tried to push himself up the bed, finally getting far enough that he'd be able to cover his feet. He waited for Langly to join him.  
  
Langly kicked his jeans off and followed with his boxers once he realised they weren't as clean as he thought, and then just stretched out along Reid's side, gathering the discarded bathrobe between his bare chest and Reid's skin, before he pulled the blanket from the other side of the bed, folding it over them. "Sorry about your leg. You've got marks from my pants."  
  
Reid reached up and pulled down a pillow for them to share, but once he'd settled, Langly curled up under his chin. "Good. That's kind of what I wanted. I have some vague memory of your fondness for fast, hard, and up against a wall, and I thought it might be enjoyable at a different angle."  
  
"It will be. We'll work the bugs out," Langly promised, the last words coming out in a yawn. "I am the luckiest man alive."  
  
"I'd argue that the title belongs to me, but not after the weekend I just had."  
  
Langly snorted. "I might concede the title, if you stop almost getting killed once a week."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please accept one (1) happy ending! Reid is once again almost in his right mind, as right as his mind ever is. All will be well and all manner of thing will be well... But, what about the Fitzgerald Institute? And what about _Chaz_? Find out when the series continues!
> 
> And, once again, I'm taking one or two weeks off between fics to work up the queue. This series will be paused for the course of one fic, as I take on another kmeme fill, as has become traditional at this time of the year. Also, yes, [there's a kmeme](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/ambiguously_anomalous/requests). Leave a prompt, fill a prompt, get crazy with the Cheez Whiz... ~~I know it looks dead, but that's because I'm the only one who's filled any prompts since 2019, and I've got like three other full-time projects going. You, my fine friends, could make it be less dead.~~


End file.
